The Prosecutor’s Office’s Proposal Chapter 45

I looked down, startled to see that my fingers were flushed red. Just as Prosecutor Joo said, the “red light” had turned on again. I suspected my cheeks and the tops of my ears were glowing just as brightly, so while I brewed the coffee, I could only hope my body temperature would cool down quickly.

I picked up a luxurious-looking cup—clearly different from the mug with the cat-paw print I usually used—and inserted a capsule into the machine. Hot coffee filled the empty cup.

I set the cup down in front of Prosecutor Joo and sat across from him. Prosecutor Joo sipped his coffee, peered at me over the rim, and offered a simple observation.

“Your face is as red as before.”

“…It’s hot in here.”

“Why would it turn red?”

Prosecutor Joo stared at me intensely as I drank my coffee in silence.

“It’s gotten even redder.”

“That’s because you keep pointing it out.”

“That still doesn’t explain why it turned red in the first place.”

He doesn’t know what it means to me to be recognized by Prosecutor Joo. We were only six years apart, but he was far more of an adult than I was, had much more social experience, and had been someone I respected for a long time.

Prosecutor Joo’s phone rang. I was startled, my shoulders trembling at the sound that disrupted the silence of the room, but I let it pass without showing it.

“I’ll take this call.”

“Yes.”

“Hello.”

Prosecutor Joo listened to the voice on the other end in silence, said he understood, and hung up briefly. Curious about what the call was about, I opened my eyes wide. Prosecutor Joo willingly filled me in.

“An informant from Danhyeon Casino World. The real culprit is fast. The order came down from the HR team to re-examine the miner’s son’s case. It looks like a setup to get him reinstated.”

“…Is that true? Then we should check to see if anyone at the casino has had any contact with the miner.”

“Of course, we have to investigate the call logs, too. But as you guessed, Officer Lee, the real culprit is someone who knows a lot about investigations. They even staged the scene to look plausible and switched the icepick—they wouldn’t have left a trail of phone calls. They probably met in person or, at best, used a burner phone.”

“It’s clear that not only are they well-versed in investigations, but they also have access to internal prosecution intelligence. They knew you hadn’t indicted the case yet, and they knew that a large amount of nicotine had been detected in Koryo-in Mr. Kim’s blood. Otherwise, there’s no way the grandfather would have emphasized the cigarettes.”

Prosecutor Joo chewed over my words thoughtfully.

“…Yeah, seeing as he emphasized the cigarettes, that seems certain. Let’s get a warrant for the communication records and check them right away.”

“Yes.”

Realistically, as he said, the chances of obtaining evidence were slim, but I wanted to do what I could. The real culprit might have let their guard down.

I took a sip of the bitter coffee and organized my complicated thoughts. There was one thing I remained curious about.

“Prosecutor.”

“Yes.”

“You said you were waiting for the miner to turn himself in for this case, too. Just like the suspect in the Grandma Park icepick murder case.”

“I was.”

“Then, by any chance, do you see the real culprit of both cases as the same person? Do you think this is a serial murder?”

I couldn’t understand on what grounds he was linking two events that had occurred seven years apart.

“What do you think, Officer Lee?”

“Excluding the fact that the confessors are both miners, it’s hard to find any common ground, so I think it’s a stretch to call it a serial murder.”

“That’s true.”

He paused for a moment before adding:

“That’s why I wonder if I’m the one who’s crazy. Sometimes it feels like I’m delusional.”

His sleek fingers set the coffee cup down. Because he set it down with a bit too much force, the coffee inside sloshed and nearly spilled over.

It didn’t fit Prosecutor Joo—a man who always had a clear sense of judgment and strong drive—to be doubting himself like that. His neat lips moved again.

“That’s why I proposed that you conspire with me, Officer Lee. I needed someone by my side to confirm if I’m having crazy thoughts.”

“If these two cases are serial murders, you think the casino is involved, don’t you?”

“Exactly.”

“Otherwise, there’s no way you would have specifically waited for someone with a background as a miner.”

“The casino is important. So is Osong Construction. Do you remember what case the late Prosecutor Yoon Soyeon was investigating before she committed suicide?”

“The bid-rigging case between the casino and Osong Construction. But it was eventually dismissed without charges, wasn’t it?”

“It’s because they won the casino hotel construction project that Osong didn’t go bankrupt.”

“Was Osong about to go bankrupt? They’re a sound company in Danhyeon.”

“You didn’t know? It was Danhyeon Casino that saved Osong from bankruptcy by giving them the hotel construction project. That was 15 years ago.”

Danhyeon Casino 15 years ago… That was around the time my father murdered the original casino owner, Kang Woosung, with an icepick.

Grandma Park had also been murdered with an icepick seven years ago. The Koryo-in was highly likely to have been supplying drugs to people connected to the casino.

Icepick, casino… coincidental words that kept overlapping.

Moreover, the intersection of those words also overlapped with my father’s case.

A small pebble had just dropped into my life, which I had barely managed to make peaceful—into the surface of the calm sea. The small ripples created by the pebble were soon swept away by the waves and vanished without a trace, but I became afraid that Prosecutor Joo might stir up a storm in the sea.

Whether he didn’t recognize my darkening complexion or knew but chose to ignore it, Prosecutor Joo continued.

“Oh Jahyeon had been pushed out of Osong Construction long before 15 years ago, and he tried to return to Osong by closing the casino hotel deal. But even after he succeeded, he couldn’t go back. He barely managed to get a director position at the casino. Currently, Oh Jahyeon’s father, who is retired, hates his youngest daughter, Oh Jahyeon, to death.”

“Why is their relationship so bad?”

“They say Oh Jahyeon’s personality was a bit strange since she was a teenager. She was nearly expelled from school once and nearly went to a juvenile detention center. It seems their relationship has been extremely strained since then.”

“…”

“I haven’t told you yet what I want us to conspire on. I’ll show you the cases I want to investigate from now on. Get up.”

I pushed away the coffee I hadn’t even finished half of and slowly stood up. I had an intense premonition that I shouldn’t hear this, but I couldn’t resist. I walked behind Prosecutor Joo down the hallway to the study inside.

Prosecutor Joo grabbed the door handle and opened it without hesitation. The study was filled with books on all sides. From law codes to humanities, novels, poetry collections, and science books.

On one empty wall stood a whiteboard, much larger than the one in the investigation office. Prosecutor Joo approached it, but the pristine white board was empty—until his large hand grabbed it and flipped it to reveal the other side.

On the back of the board, which occupied half the wall, the cases he had collected were spread out in every direction. Hanging like IV drips were materials such as newspaper articles, crime scene photos, and autopsy photos.

And there was the face of the familiar casino director, Oh Jahyeon. In the center of the spiderweb spread in every direction was a photo of Oh Jahyeon attached to the board.

A person who knows a prosecutor at the Danhyeon branch and can hear investigation intelligence; a person involved in the casino.

I slowly moved my feet and approached the board. There were as many as four cases that Prosecutor Joo thought Oh Jahyeon was involved in.

“Don’t tell me… do you think Oh Jahyeon committed all these cases? If so, why didn’t you start an investigation for drugs?”

“Because the truth I’m seeking isn’t something as superficial as that.”

Since I couldn’t take in the whole board at once, I examined what each case was, one by one, starting from the right.

The first was the ‘Koryo-in Mr. Kim body abandonment case.’ The case we had investigated together for the first time.

The second was the ‘Grandma Park icepick murder case.’ The case he had assigned me as an assignment.

These were cases I was already well aware of, but it was the first time I learned that Prosecutor Joo considered Oh Jahyeon the real culprit for both. I had thought he only had the Koryo-in case on his list of suspects at most.

The real culprit, Oh Jahyeon—it wasn’t a picture I couldn’t imagine.

I thought of Oh Jahyeon’s physique and said to Prosecutor Joo:

“If Oh Jahyeon abandoned Koryo-in Mr. Kim’s body, we have to assume there was an accomplice. Is it possible she instigated the grandfather who turned himself in today to abandon it?”

“She wouldn’t have left the abandonment to that small grandfather. She probably only instigated the confession. There’s a separate, sturdy male helper.”